Finger Trap
by DdraigCoch
Summary: Postwar drabble. Harry laments over Remus' silence. RemusSirius, HarryDraco, PG13


Title: **Fingertrap**  
Fandom: Harry Potter  
Pairings: Remus/Sirius, Draco/Harry  
Timeline: Long after the War.  
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the Harry Potter universe (more's the pity), and I mean no harm with this non-profit piece of 'work'.  
Notes: Written for the contrelamontre 'Love – show it' challenge in 58 minutes.  
Summery: A moment in Grimauld Place, after the war.

A clock patiently ticked away the seconds in the long hallway. New varnish turned the wooden floorboards a deep red in the slanted sunlight of the afternoon, and a man dug through the piles of old coats and cloaks in search of his own. Time had been kind to Remus Lupin when so little else had been. The only sign of its passage was his shock of white hair which curled slightly at his collar, all tracks of the brown of his youth washed away. His face remained as placid and bemused as the clocks. Indeed, Harry, watching from the stairwell, believed that the only difference between them was that the clock's boasted more emotion.

"Where are you going?" He asked. Remus turned to face him only briefly before resuming his search.

"Have you seen my cloak? The brown one?"

"Draco threw it out. He claimed dust griffins were nesting in it." The younger wizard replied easily, dutifully avoiding the creaking steps although the screaming portrait of his godfather's mother had been torn down long ago. He liked to think that his godfather found it amusing. "Where are you going?"

The loss of his favourite cloak didn't seem to affect the ex professor in the least. Instead he took one of the others, a fine black wool cloak that he knew to be Draco's favourite cloak. A Marauder never truly retires.

"Where I always go." Remus replied just as easily, scooping up the damp bouquet of roses from the hall table. "I'll be back for supper." He offered over his shoulder as he made for the door. Harry frowned softly after him when the door clicked shut. He'd lived with the werewolf since the end of the war so many years ago. Together with Draco they'd ripped out most of the Black manor's interior and replaced it, renewed it and made it a place to live in again. Years of labour and planning. Years of living. And he still felt like an outsider in the werewolf's world.

"Would it be so difficult to just tell me you're going to his grave?" Harry whispered miserably to himself.

"Maybe it is." The drawling baritone came from behind him, and the pointed chin rested on his shoulder. Harry jumped before realising just who had snuck up on him. The voice echoed his thoughts as the pale hands of a priest folded themselves against his belly. "Mad-eye would be turning in his grave, Potter."

"What do you mean?" Harry asked, resting his own weather beaten hands atop his lover's.

"What was it he was always spouting? 'Constant Vigi-"

"Don't be a prick, Malfoy." Harry admonished him. He didn't expect an apology. He knew better.

"Maybe it is hard for him to tell you. Especially you. People like Lupin don't confess their motives, their feelings or their secrets just because you want to know. People like Lupin must be given a 'reason' to tell. Doesn't mean they don't care."

"People like you, you mean?" Harry asked. He was staring at the door, still imagining what his mentor might have to say to his godfather.

"If you like."

Draco's tongue was always a double edged sword, and even Harry had a great deal of trouble unravelling the meaning behind each phrase. The only person that didn't seemed to be Remus, whose words were needles hidden in cloth themselves. It took him a second to decode this conversation, but finally the boy who lived knew exactly what the other meaning was.

What it meant was this: 'If something happened to you I would take you dew damp red and gold roses too, wrapped in a black ribbon. And I'd take them every week. I'd mourn for you like Remus mourns for Sirius.'

"You can be so romantic, Draco." Harry murmered sardonicly.

Smiling to himself he turned in Draco's arms and gave him a long, lingering, reassuring kiss that needed no decoding, and held its secrets on display.


End file.
